Call me crazy, but up until this point I’ve had an extremely hard time actually accepting the fact that Donald Trump is running for president.

Yet, is it really crazy for me to have had a hard time accepting this when the last time I truly “tuned into Trump” was during the days of his reality TV series, The Apprentice?

As a matter of fact, my last memory from The Apprentice was when Trump decided to tell a female contestant that, ‘it would be a pretty picture to see her on her knees.’ Knowing little about the depths of Trump’s misogyny at the time, I’m sure you can imagine how taken back I was by this comment.

In recent months, as I’ve come around to the reality of Trump running for president, I’ve done much research on his inherent display of misogyny. With this, I’ve come to see several common patterns in the way Trump makes these frequent misogynistic comments and thus, developed some deep-seeded concerns on the matter. Concerns, I believe, are strong enough to harm an entire country of women, if not an entire world.

To explain, I’d like to look at Trump’s 2004 tome titled Trump: How to Get Rich, where he is quoted stating, “I believe we’re all equal except women still have to try harder and they know it. They will do what they have to do to get the job done and will not necessarily be demure about it.”

What is particularly concerning about this statement is Trump’s entire dismissal of the social connotations the concept of “women having to work harder” holds. This consistent dismissal for the everyday struggles of women in the United States, and the societal processes that largely continue them, lead me to believe that Trump is one of two things: either stupid or altogether manipulative.

How could Trump possibly “believe” women are equal to men among society, if women have to “try harder?”

Is he stating this from a manipulative standpoint, and thus intends to encourage and continue this misogyny throughout his potential presidency, for the benefits of himself and the entire male sex at large? Is Trump aware that a comment stated in this type of way will go right over many people’s heads? In other words, is this an act of intentional deception?

Or is he truly so stupid that it goes right over his head too?

For everyone’s sake, I truly hope Trump is just stupid, for manipulation is often an impossible issue to tackle.